While rereading Edmund Morgan’s magisterial American Slavery, American Freedom , I was struck by his discussion of public penance performed by early Virginian fornicators and adulterers. The courts, for example, prescribed penances for couples who appeared with children too soon after . . . . Continue Reading »
You can produce an immigration policy that is all three. I have some thoughts about it over at National Review Online . . . . . Continue Reading »
Speaking before 2000 young people upon his recent arrival in Ireland, President Obama raised the old canard that religious education is divisive : If towns remain divided—if Catholics have their schools and buildings and Protestants have theirs, if we can’t see ourselves in one another . . . . Continue Reading »
At Public Discourse today, I explain what led the Left to rebuke the authentically American understanding of religious liberty after the 1993 passage of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act: Understanding why religious liberty became politically controversial requires more than just identifying . . . . Continue Reading »
Among the rough and ready tests of character, this seems a very good one, not infallible but close to it, accounting for the occasional hard day, bad headache, annoying companions: “The way people treat restaurant staff is, I think, a kind of poker tell, revealing a person’s character . . . . Continue Reading »
“In February, U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Edith Jones gave a controversial speech defending and endorsing the American system of capital punishment,” says Stephanos Bibas in today’s column . She was accused of “compromising her judicial impartiality” The . . . . Continue Reading »
Priests’ councils “treat parishes as square holes into which pastors are fitted like interchangeable pegs,” says George Weigel in today’s column . There are “good parishes” and “tough parishes”; good parishes are given out as rewards; tough parishes are . . . . Continue Reading »
When it comes to mixing religion and politics, I’ve often thought, the principle seems to be, it’s wrong when the other guy does it. For example, conservatives become annoyed when Christians call for liberalizing immigration laws or for universal healthcare. Don’t impose your . . . . Continue Reading »
Justin Taylor has a lovely post here summarizing what we might learn about Christian friendship from the correspondence of Esther Edwards Burr (1732-1758), Jonathan Edwards’ daughter and Aaron Burr’s mother, with her friend Sarah Prince. An excerpt: Modern readers are sometimes taken . . . . Continue Reading »
Fr. George Rutler, pastor of the vibrantly orthodox Church of Our Saviour in midtown Manhattan, is being reassigned to St. Michael’s Church in Hell’s Kitchen. In his latest weekly column , Rutler acknowledges a quiet campaign against the reassignment: I was gratified that so many wanted . . . . Continue Reading »
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